


the sun does not cause us to grow

by brella



Category: Morning Glories
Genre: 4 + 1 Things - Freeform, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-21
Updated: 2014-10-21
Packaged: 2018-02-22 00:29:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2487788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brella/pseuds/brella
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four times Jade trusted Casey, and the one time she didn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the sun does not cause us to grow

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for the [nowhere else to go](http://blevins.livejournal.com/29667.html?thread=599267#t599267) ficathon. Sorrow! My favorite!

**1.**    
  
Casey's hand is cold. Not because she's dead, or anything. That would suck. And anyway, you at least know the difference between the frigidities of death (stale) and life (frightened, a little); that's the kind of expertise you earn when you lie next to your mom's momentary corpse on a sun-seared highway and hold onto her fingers. So. Maybe it's your own fault.   
  
You frown hesitantly over at her because you've known her for a grand total of two weeks and this isn't a habit that people who are practically strangers get into—holding each other's hands—but it's not like you're complaining.   
  
"What?" you finally prompt her, unable to keep the skepticism out of your voice. You brush some hanging bangs out of your eyes with your other fingers, tucking them into place behind your ear. Zoe is in the shower; you can hear it running. Pamela's doing curfew checks.   
  
Casey's hair is tied messily back, and her pajama tee is rumpled from the way that she's sitting—crunched into the desk chair, heels barely set on the edge, knees apart. Her mouth thins with resolve, or maybe restraint.   
  
"I just," and she shakes her head, palm coming to rest on her forehead, and you watch her, biting the side of your lip, frowning; "I just want you to know that I'm—we're going to fix this; we're going to figure it out. Your dad, the nightmares… everything."   
  
It's a complete non sequitur. You'd just been tiredly talking about the Niko Riots for your Antiquities and Middle Ages class tomorrow morning; you blink at the words, but still don't move your hand away.   
  
"Um," you answer, "Okay?"   
  
Casey grimaces and pinches the bridge of her nose. "Look, I-I'm sorry. I just… I wanted to say it. I wanted to promise, so you'd know I hadn't—forgotten, or whatever."   
  
At that—the sort of clumsy sincerity in the statements, the way she tugs subtly at her earlobe in something like sheepishness—you feel your lips quirk upwards, just a little. By the time she glances over at you again, it's gone.   
  
"Just trust me, okay?" she murmurs, squeezing your hand, sending a jolt of warmth all the way up to the base of your neck that you try not to acknowledge. "We'll be okay. Trust me."   
  
You can't believe you say the truth aloud, because it stirs so nicely inside of you, unspoken; seeing Casey like this, though, seeing her looking tired and sore but still determined if only for your sake, pulls it straight out of your chambers.  
  
"I do." 

 

* * *

 

 

 **2.**    
  
"No," she announces with a staunch shake of her head that sends her blonde curls shifting in the sunlight through the window. "No, you do  _not_  want to ingest that; take my word for it."   
  
You wrinkle your nose at the meatloaf on a plate in front of you. It's only a slab, a perfect rectangle, suspiciously whole, more like a piece of banana bread than anything resembling meat.   
  
"I don't know, it looks," and the skepticism is glaringly obvious in your voice, "Nice?"   
  
Casey huffs and nudges your ankle with her toes, spurring you into walking forward again and out of the lunch line. She strides along beside you, tray held neatly in front of her, eyes darting periodically around as if to scan for an oncoming attack.   
  
"That's probably why we never see any students' bodies, is all I'm saying," Casey mutters, and you half-gasp, half-laugh, nudging your body into hers.   
  
"Jesus, Casey, don't get all morbid," you chastise her, all hypocritically, because you are the reigning queen of morbid, probably. "It's probably just some of that crap you can get pre-frozen."   
  
"Does this place look like it's near a grocery store?" Casey demands with a raise of her eyebrows that you wryly return. She rolls her eyes at your mischievous smirk. "Trust me, Jade. Toss it while you still can."   
  
So, at the next trash can, you do. 

 

* * *

 

 

 **3.**    
  
Casey's nose is bleeding from both nostrils. Her eyes are frantic. You can't keep your hands off of her face, checking for signs of damage, even while she rapidly whispers instructions to you, even when she circles her scabbed fingers around your wrists to try to stop you.   
  
"Jade, seriously, I'm fine," she assures you, and you snort at her in spite of yourself, fixing her with a brief and cursory glare.   
  
"You sure as hell don't  _look_  it," you snap, combing her hair back out of her face, palms coming to cup her cheeks. Half-coagulated blood spreads on them. "What'd he do to you? What  _happened_?"   
  
"It doesn't matter," Casey whispers, and before you can argue with her, she drops her forehead against yours, pushes it, really, so that you have to stiffen to keep from being inclined backwards; you slightly graze your fingers over the corners of her eyes, still holding her face (still feeling fury rise, heartbeat on heartbeat, at every new cut and bruise you see). "I'll live."   
  
"What  _happened_?" you repeat hotly, jostling her slightly.   
  
She takes you by surprise, then—she snakes her arms around you, under your shoulders, and pulls you close, face brushing yours when she leaves a kiss where more words of protest would be; she's warm and her heart sounds like it's scattering inside of her and the clearing is so quiet. You can't even see the greenhouse. She hadn't wanted you close enough to have a vantage point. You don't know why. You wish you had the guts to ask her.   
  
"You don't want to know," she murmurs, face buried in your neck, palms flat and desperate on your spine. "We just, we—we need to go. Okay? Please, Jade,  _please_."   
  
She's never begged you for anything. You have every intention of listening, because you believe her; you believe the wild fear that had possessed her blue eyes and you believe every inch of her, every shape her tongue makes, every war march her heart beats out. Part of you wants to stay here like this, out in the open night, and tell her all about growing up, about the thunderstorms you remember from back home that would turn the cloudy skies purple.   
  
Instead, you nod against her and awkwardly stand, and she doesn't let go of your hand.

 

* * *

 

 **4.**    
  
One word springs to mind: bullshit.   
  
"I mean, let's face it, right?" you kind of snarl, facing away from her, scribbling nonsense on your notebook page to try to look busy. "I'm messed up in the head, I cry all the fucking time, I'm not that smart or brave or strong or  _good for anything_ , and hey, I'm fuck-ugly, too. Check off that little box."   
  
You have no fucking clue why you say it. Who in their right mind argues when somebody like Casey Blevins mumbles, in the dark, eyes pensively on your throat, "I love you?"   
  
That was a rhetorical question. Like you know anybody in their right mind! Ha, ha. Well, actually, maybe Hunter counts. He's boring and he's scared shitless of Zoe, so he's probably at least kind of sane.  
  
"So don't give me any of that bullshit," you continue, and this time your voice shows the hot tears welling up in your stupid eyes, and you grip the pen harder. "You love me. You're joking, right?"   
  
Casey is silent but for a barely whispered, "No."   
  
You whirl on her, ready to fling back more disagreements, more evasions, but you halt and freeze at the sight of her mascara running in light shapes down her face and her shoulders hunched behind her bowed head. She sniffles. Her mouth is twisted down. More tears spring up and slide down her cheeks, to her chin, where they dangle for a moment before falling.   
  
And you swear—you  _swear_ , in that moment—you might actually believe her.

 

* * *

 

 

 **+.**    
  
Nothing comes. You don't scream, or curse, or cry, or flinch, or run. You stand there, everything inside of you draining to your ankles and then somewhere beyond, and the only part of you that isn't limp is the spine holding you up.   
  
"I'm sorry," Casey whispers, tears streaking her face again. She wipes them away with the heel of her palm. The hand holding the gun hangs uselessly at her side. "I thought—I thought it would… I thought…"   
  
Maybe there are good intentions in there, if you look hard enough, but you can't be bothered to do that now. You think of your mother, wandering around outside of a grave and never calling out for you; you think of what your father's voice had sounded like on the phone when he'd sworn vehemently that he had no daughter; you think of how hard you had sobbed and writhed and yanked at your hair when you'd realized that Jimmy had probably forgotten you, too.   
  
"You?" you croak, curling your hand into a fist as if to expunge the body memory of holding hers. "You… you're the reason we're here. Me. Hunter. Zoe. That kid in the basement, the one without the eyes."   
  
"I didn't know," she insists, teeth gritted. You've never seen her in this much pain. "I swear to God, I—Hodge only just told me now, I—God, Jade,  _please_  believe me; I thought—I thought—"  
  
She stammers and whines and nothing of substance comes out. You finally take a step back, then two, then three.   
  
"You're just like them," you murmur. "You're  _one_  of them."   
  
"I—I was," she chokes. "Or m- _maybe_  I was, I don't, I don't know. She told me I could save my parents—she told me I could save everyone. All I had to do was follow the instructions on the paper, and I…"   
  
"You  _lied_  to me," you shout, even though you know it isn't really true, you  _know_  maybe she's being honest with you, but a part of you doubts it. There's something more; there has to be. It's a weird feeling—having your savior turn out to have been your captor all along, or something like it. You wipe at your mouth with one hand, maybe to get rid of her taste from this morning. "Casey, we—we were supposed to have each other, no matter what. That was our  _one_  rule in this hellhole. And you—"  
  
"I'm sorry," Casey says again. You're already out the door, buckling under how little you buy it.


End file.
